Blooming Women
  • Bl(oom)ing Women Accessory Salon
  • Home + Table of Contents
  • Watch us grow!
  • About Blooming Women
  • About Being a Contributor
  • Contact
  • Happy Birthday, Blooming Women! One Year Today!
  • Blog—Maniacal Musings—Becky Lyn Rickman, Managing Editor
  • Blog—Jessica's Journey—Jessica VanVactor, Guest Contributor
  • Blog—My Armenia—Carol Rickman's Blog
  • Dealing with miscarriage
  • My Story
  • Circles
  • The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly of Being Single
  • 5 Stages of divorce recovery
  • The Circus is in Town
  • (You're covered with) The Fingerprints of God
  • Thunder Roared and Love Soared
  • A Period Piece
  • A sneak preview of the Gertie sequel!
  • Six Steps to Cultivate your Femininity in the Business World
  • Chore Zoning or Don't try this at home!
  • The 50 with Meredith Morse—Opera Singer
  • The 50 with Jessica VanVactor
  • Memorizing Joy
  • AT LAST! My interview with Shan White, Life Coach for women in transition
  • Questions and statements we don't care if we never, ever get asked or told again (am I right, girls?)
  • The Date
  • Moonshadow's Spirit
  • Broken Writer + Hypnotherapy = Amazing Trips
  • The "R" Word
  • The 50 with Carol Shepherd Rickman
  • Triumph During Transitions
  • A Kentucky Afternoon
  • Mothers
  • 10 things chemo taught me
  • What if . . .
  • Forgiveness—A poem
  • Mantegories (n. from the Latin; man+categories)
  • Insomnia 101
  • Blooming Bud Interview: Sierra
  • Masterful Mindsets
  • It's in the bag!
  • Important lessons for children: Start where you are, use what you have, do what you can
  • Nursery rhymes, and times, and slimes, and grimes, and crimes
  • Things I learned as a single mom
  • Sadie's Soapbox: Dating
  • The Dress
  • 8 Things That Have Surprised Me About Having a Large Family
  • The gift of longing
  • The Semicolon Project
  • Most embarrassing moments—culinary edition
  • MilitaReality—a brat's perspective
  • About those elusive wisps of thought
  • Being there
  • The Giving Mom
  • How I still haven't learned to keep my smart mouth shut!
  • If you give a mom a cookie . . .
  • Cacti and Geraniums
  • The Three Gardeners
  • Beauty is as beauty does
  • Words for Sabra
  • Arm scratching in Baltimore
  • Pornography didn't kill our love and friendship . . . I did . . . and how we got it back
  • Hardening off our little bloomers
  • The Wonderful, Magical Women of Blooming Television
  • Shake it like a Polaroid picture!
  • 25 Date Nights (that aren't dinner and a movie)
  • Hills Like White Elephants
  • Maryland Beaten Biscuits
  • The night we thought the house was exploding
  • A mysterious case of goosebumps or "What is that on the wall?"
  • Militareality—Real stories of military wives
  • Finding my metal in wood
  • Another blooming bud interview
  • Chariot of Fire
  • Secret gifts of love
  • The best prank I ever pulled was . . .
  • Connie
  • Dating and other hazards
  • Favorite childhood memories
  • When God speaks . . .
  • Zanie gets into another sticky situation
  • No-see-ums: A little useful information
  • I love my kids, but . . .
  • Meg's poem
  • Another blooming bud interview
  • Some of my favorite herbal recipes are . . .
  • I love my cat, but . . .
  • I love all creatures, but . . .
  • The thing all girls and women must see and know . . .
  • The Great Chicken Debacle
  • The Powerful Influence of Brothers
  • How I feel about blooming is . . .
  • Sometimes grandma is up—other times she is simply upside-down
  • Anyone out there as anxious as I am?
  • Some of my funniest childhood memories are . . .
  • You might be addicted to Harry Potter if . . .
  • This month's survey:
  • Another Blooming Bud interview
  • The most valuable life lesson I've learned is . . .
  • The greatest blessing to come out of the most painful thing I ever experienced was . . .
  • The most powerful influence on my life is . . .
  • The thing that could have broken our family, but didn't was . . .
  • The funniest thing that ever happened to me was . . .
  • The time my dad really surprised me was when . . .
  • NEW FEATURE: Interviews with Blooming Buds
  • ANOTHER NEW FEATURE: A survey
  • The most valuable life lesson I've ever learned is . . .
  • My most embarrassing moment was when . . .
  • What really puzzles me is . . .
  • One of the most fun days I ever had was . . .
  • The most scared I've ever been was when . . .
  • The people who have been the biggest influence on me are . . .
  • I like to relax by . . .
  • The best way to do . . .
  • My most embarrassing moment was when . . .
  • The most fun I ever had was when . . .
  • When I grow up, I want to be . . .
  • What really puzzles me is . . .
  • The most amazing bargain I ever found was . . .
  • Those annoying things kids do and what they mean
  • My shameless self-promotion
  • The thing about getting older is . . .
Hannah watching over her zone!

chore zoning or don't try this at home!

By Becky Lyn Rickman, Managing Editor
From brilliant idea to epic fail in one short day!
Originally published on www.familyshare.com

I had no idea that the brilliant and so-ahead-of-its-time alternative to chores would be such a recipe for disaster.

"Oh, my word, I've got it!" I shouted, leaping from my bed. Lying there in the dim light of the new day, I had devised a new sort of chore plan that would revolutionize that most painful task of parenting and surely would land me in some sort of parental hall of fame. So decisively brilliant was this new idea that I could actually see myself explaining and teaching it on countless talk shows. Other parents would sigh in relief and implement this new method in their own homes and it would be taught in universities for students of early childhood development.

Continuing to bask in the glow of my unprecedented brilliance, I quickly went to my laptop and made a slideshow, spreadsheets, diagrams and a handbook for each of our children. I could not wait to present it to our family that evening. All day I walked around with a smile on my face like the cat that ate the canary. It made the children pause in fearful anticipation.

After dinner, chores were completed and we all gathered in the living room. I was given the floor to present my plan and present I did.

"Zoning — the new method of chores for children," I beamed proudly.

Quizzical looks.

"Don't you see? OK, just follow along in your handbook. Each of you, rather than rotating traditional chores, will be put in charge of one particular room of the house and that will be yours to maintain. You will each have a 'zone' that you are responsible for overseeing. That way, you will learn so much more. You'll understand what it means to maintain, to manage, to supervise, to oversee ... you will have complete stewardship over one small island in our home.

"Living room: Hannah, this is yours. Make sure that nothing is left in there by anyone, it is vacuumed and dusted, windows clean, things like that.

"Downstairs bathroom Grace, that is yours. Just make sure the toilet and sink are clean and that the trash is emptied and no one leaves things in there.

"Dining room, Tanner, you take care of that room. When people finish their homework, make sure they clean up after themselves and that all places are cleared after dinner. Sweep the floor and vacuum the carpet underneath the table. Dust the buffet."

I continued down the line of children and zones, having them highlight in their handbooks the chores involved in their particular zone so that they understood completely. They all smiled at the idea and I was completely and utterly pleased with myself and ignorant of the plans they were devising behind those smiles. After our meeting was adjourned, we all had a snack and played a game and then we dismissed everyone to get ready for bed. That's where the fun began.

"Mom, you left your clipboard in the living room," Tanner grinned. "Please take it with you when you leave."

I looked him in the eye and I could swear he was channeling a foreign dictator. He was smiling, but his eyes had a sort of ominous glow.

The next morning, when I descended the stairs to the kitchen, I noticed that each child was standing at the doorway of their zone with feet shoulder-width apart, arms crossed in front of their chests, and wearing the blank, but resolute expression of a palace guard. The only thing missing was a beret and sniper rifle. Their whole demeanor screamed silently, "Just you try and leave a gum wrapper in my zone."

I crept past each one and made my way into Rose's zone: the kitchen. There she stood in rubber gloves, mop and bucket at the ready, just waiting for me to spill or drop something.

I began making breakfast, but watched my back with every move. It was like cooking for a militia and fearing they might not like what I made. I cracked an egg and immediately disposed of its shell. I whisked the pancake batter, and right away washed the whisk. I was beginning to buckle under the pressure of scrutiny. What had I wrought?

I decided to hold my breath and see what the rest of the day brought. I could not have foreseen the disastrous results of my revolutionary new method. No one could do anything without eyes following their every move. Nerves were fraying. I could sense a battle of epic proportion brewing. I called the children into my office and let them witness me deleting the slideshow, the manual, the spreadsheets . . . and my self-nomination letter for mother of the century.


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